


Thrill of the Chase

by AceQueenKing



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Seducing the Librarian, Sith Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-08-28 00:18:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16712848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: "Mr…" Her lips pursed, as if she had had a particularly distasteful task to do, such as scrubbing the blood out of her robes, and then she looked up at him in eagle-eyed clarity. “Palpatine. The things you are asking for are restricted. Few Jedi would ever have access to such …seditiousmaterial.”





	Thrill of the Chase

**Author's Note:**

  * For [unspeakablehorror](https://archiveofourown.org/users/unspeakablehorror/gifts).



Darth Sidious wanted something out of his reach and, as always, his thoughts were focused on how, exactly, he would find a way to bid the item to his will. He knew it was only a matter of time until the lovely specimen fell into his lap, for it was the fate of all things to one day belong to him. The question was only how long it would take, and what sort of events he would need to manipulate in order to free the last Sith Holocron his master had left from the Jedi Archive.

There was some irony to that, he mused; if it were not for Darth Plageuis’ control over life and death, he would himself leave the old holocron there, knowing full well how it would delight his old master’s love of satire. There was something most amusing about the Jedi holding such dangerous knowledge…but something even more frustrating about their total inability to use it.

As if the boy had been summoned by his thinking of it, Anakin Skywalker knocked at his office door. He could always tell it was the boy: he knocked the door with all the subtly of an outer-realm oaf. But that was alright; the boy would be Sith soon enough, and there was little need for him to have an apprentice with any sense of subtlety. Let Skywalker kick open the doors; he would be the shadows that had oozed between the cracks long before.

“Ah, my boy.” He looked up and saw the incoming-storm on Skywalker’s face; Obi-Wan had said something mean to him, no doubt, and he needed a distraction. Sidious was happy to be a supportive influence, provided the boy was willing to be supported on his path down to the dark side. He listened to every other word the boy was saying, about how Obi-Wan wasn’t listening to him and how even the librarians were looking down on him. At the word library, Sidious perked up and started paying attention again.

“Jocasta Nu won’t even let me in the record room, even though _younglings_ are allowed in! It’s not fair!” Anakin picked up a pen on his desk and threw it somewhere off to the side in a fit of adolescent anger. Sidious hid a smile by looking down at his paperwork. Oh yes, the corruption of young Skywalker was going splendidly, and he had just figured a way to occupy two of his goals at once.

“My boy, you must simply prove to this librarian that Obi-Wan is wrong about his estimations of you. You must…charm her.” He stood, dusting off his robes. “If it would help you, why, I could give you a list of materials that I myself would like from the Jedi archives. You comport yourself well, and their opinion will improve of you, and you will be saving me a trip as well.”

Sidious bit back glee as he grabbed a datapad, hastily assembling a list of materials. The first few were harmless, of course, but there were also a few datapads on Sith, and of course a few holocrons – most harmless, but the one he wanted, of course, was not. For once, he was happy he had not pushed too hard with Dooku to acquire these items – oh, he’d tried, but Dooku was always too prim to break into a library. Skywalker, thankfully, had no such compunctions; sooner or later, he’d turn the boy on them, and he’d love it.

“Do…chancellors normally have an interest in Jedi material?” Sidious looked up, annoyed; of course, Skywalker had a brain when he least wanted him to have one. It was not normal, no, but then Sidious was good at thinking on his feet.

“Not normally, no,” he said. “But we rarely fight one, and I know Dooku had read some of these materials. I would think reading them would….give me some idea of what sort of philosophy he may have.”

“Oh,” said Anakin, who nodded vigorously. “I suppose that makes sense. Alright.” He grinned. “I’ll try it.”

Sidious watched him leave with some glee. Finally, his plan was coming together.

He looked out over the Coruscant cityscape, and plotted what he would do with the biggest eyesores once he finally owned it all.

He would start with the Jedi Temple, he decided; he never liked the ugly, overly elaborate building. Once he got rid of the pesky Jedi inside, he’d make it the proper Sith structure it always should have been.

Darth Plageuis wasn’t the only Sith Lord with an appreciation for irony.

***

Anakin returned only three hours later, and Sidious’ mood was jubilant over this until the boy kicked open the door to his office and he could see that he only carried two of the eight things he had asked for. He scowled.

“That does not look nearly like what I asked you to provide, boy,” he said. He picked up the datapad and felt completely disappointed – it wasn’t even datapads he’d asked for. The top datapad was _The Jedi: A Path to Peace_ – a propagandistic trifle – and _The Role of Peace: A Jedi Warrior in His Proper Role_ which was somehow even more boring. “Not even remotely.”  
  
“Miss Nu said I couldn’t have anything you asked for.” Anakin folded his charms to his chest, sulking. “She said if you read those, you’d have a better idea of what to ask for and told me to come back when I appreciated a datapad as more than a place to set my kaf.”

“What an unpleasant woman,” Sidious said, and then sighed. It appeared he’d overestimated Skywalker, or perhaps underestimated the Jedi: the barging through the front door approach would not work with this one.

It was time to glide under the door through some shadows. He gathered the datapads and looked at Skywalker. “You’re dismissed for now, my boy.”

“But – “

“I will return these to your librarian. I will…have a word. You will see, my boy; she will owe you an apology, yet.”

“…Okay,” Anakin said, shrugging. He stormed out the door and Sidious gathered the datapads to his chest as he prepared his assault on this – _Jocasta Nu_. He would get his holocron, with or without the Jedi’s cooperation.

* * *

A few hours later, he had come up with a plan of attack.

First: Jocasta Nu had lived in the temple her whole life. Typical of any Jedi, she lived on a diet of bland, protein-packed but flavorless food, with robes spun of itchy homespun cloth: a life that was packed with all the excitement of a dusty library with bright, humming fluorescent lighting.

Sidious could imagine no greater hell.

He studied his robe in the mirror as he contemplated what to wear. It had been many a year since Sidious had gone a-wooing, but he was sure that his senate finery would more than dazzle the dull Jedi librarian. He had gone for one of his most avant-garde senatorial robes – there was a hint of conservative dress, but only just – with rich, red velvet brocade sleeves that draped nearly to the floor. It was quite reminiscent of the ancient wardrobes of kings of the Naboo – not that that was something she would likely be aware of; Jedi librarians were not prized for their knowledge of _culture_. All the better for him.

He fussed with the remaining clasps and picked up the datapads she’d sent. He’d looked through them enough to have a short conversation about them – though he was loath to do so, and everything he read in the Jedi tomes made him grateful to be Sith, so abhorrent were they. The Jedi were so _sanctimonious_ and _boring_. He’d never bothered with regrets for being passed over by the Jedi in his youth, and now he was doubly glad his father had done him the one small favor of faking his midiclorian test so the Jedi did not get their hands on them.

It hadn’t worked out well for his father, but still: one did not look a gift horse in the mouth. Even a frozen corpse could have the right idea once in a while.

He walked down to his own speeder, drawing eyebrows from one of the guards as he checked out without a driver. He generally preferred to do anything … _outside_ of official duties on foot or in his own personal speeder, but the ambassadorial version he had at his disposal would be far better for accessing the Jedi temple with a minimum of fuss.

He enjoyed driving the speeding car by himself for the first time in a long time: he had always enjoyed the being in control, and the reigns of a tightly-controlled engine were but one powerful thing under his command. He let himself weave in and out of the Coruscant traffic like a daydream, carefully making sure to almost but not quite bump several cars along the way. He smirked at every skyspeeder’s beep.  Ah, what was the point of being a Sith Lord if one couldn’t rouse a bit of darkness in others?

By the time he landed on the Jedi’s ambassadorial helipad, he was as relaxed as he could possibly be while simultaneously entering under the hall of his most ancient enemy. He smiled and nodded at the Jedi, who looked back at him, seeing nothing of what he was. He scoffed under his breath. It was hard to believe that thousands of generations of Sith Lords had ever been cautious of the Jedi. They literally couldn’t spot a Sith under their noses.

He made it to the Library by following the signs (and what kind of place of learning had _signs_ for the children; a true Sith learned their way by memory or perished in the attempt to find their way to where they were going). He located the woman who matched Jocasta Nu’s official picture from the Senate databank easily. She was an older woman, with soft grey hair held high with chopsticks. That, Sidious approved of – it was always good to have a weapon on hand. Why in his younger years, he’d had a couple explosive clips in his own locks, before age had thinned it to the point that the only weapon he held was the lightsaber he had enclosed in an inner pocket of the robe.

His hand closed over it as he hit the bell to grab the datapad-lender’s attention; it was so tempting, honestly, to light it, to let the Jedi know just what sort of beast they had let into their lair…

“Yes?” She said, turning toward him with a pinched mouth. “Can I help you?”

She looked over his outfit and he felt her evaluate him with cool, grey eyes. He smiled. He was used to being impressive.

“Yes, are you miss Nu?” He flashed her most pearly of white teeth.  
  
“ _Librarian_ Nu.” Her tone was sharp and withering; the Sith Lord was intrigued, even as the Senate Chancellor had to force his face to drop in disappointment. “Can I help you, Chancellor?”  
  
“Ah, you know who I am, excellent.” He dropped the two datapads on the counter. “I simply couldn’t put down these two tomes you sent back with my erm….friend.” Her eyebrows rose in clear curiosity, and he chuckled lightly. “I was hoping you perhaps might supply the items on the list I asked for, now that I have a far better understanding of the Jedi creed and codes.”

She took a deep breath, saying nothing; instead, she reached toward the datapads he had put on the counter, flipping through them as if she suspected that he – or Skywalker – had defiled the document in some fashion. He rolled his eyes. He may be a Sith Lord, but even he didn’t dare to harm a datapad that didn’t belong to him. He wasn’t without _manners_.

“They seem to be in one piece,” she said quietly, putting the datapads down. “And I am glad they helped you understand a bit more about what we do here. But Mr….” Her lips pursed, as if she had had a particularly distasteful task to do, such as scrubbing the blood out of her robes, and then she looked up at him in eagle-eyed clarity. “Palpatine. The things you are asking for are _restricted_. Even your little….assistant would never have access to such …seditious material.”

“I do apologize if Anakin has gotten on the wrong foot with you; that was never my intention.” He would uphold his promise to the boy, for now, to try to clear him in the graces of the librarian; she narrowed her eyes, looking less than fooled.

“The boy has little interest in learning,” she said. “But his faults are not your own, Chancellor. What did you need such treasonous filth for?”

“It’s Dooku, I’m afraid.” He put on his deathly serious security matter mask, one he had always delighted in bringing out. “Strategically, your ex-Jedi has left us quite in the dust.”

“You were friends as I recall,” Jocasta said with a half-smile, looking disturbingly like the cat had gotten the cream.

“Yes, once,” Sidious didn’t even bother to hide his truths in falsehoods. “He was a good man, _once_.” He let his eyes go low, as if he did not want to confront an ugly truth, though truly he wanted to hide his own grin.

“I often wonder….” He said, in the tone he’d perfected for pitiful announcements in the Senate. “If I could have only understood him better, perhaps I could have…”

He waited the requisite sixty seconds of wistful regret before turning back to her, curiosity overcoming performance. Her eyes had softened; her hand reached out to grasp his, and he held it. He held it longer than he did for those in this senate he allowed to touch him directly, feeling something odd in his chest.

“We are often fooled by what we do not wish to see,” Jocasta Nu said, gently patting his hand without withdrawing. Were those – blush marks? On her cheeks? The Sith Lord strutted in his mind. _Hook, line, and sinker, Sidious._

“I thought perhaps, if I read what he spoke of… Experienced what he felt in his time of deepest doubt…” He sighed, drumming his fingers on Nu’s countertop. She looked at him as if she was seeing him for the first time, surprise and pity evident in her sharpened features. She was surely a good-looking woman in her youth, and so much more the pity for her commitment to the dull order of the Jedi.

“Your feelings are commendable, chancellor,” she said, her voice all soft and breathy, a maiden’s prayer. He smiled thinly. The path was set before her, he had only to wait for her walk it. He reached for her, the grin growing wider, but she took a step back, shaking her head.

“But as a Jedi, we are not…meant to deal with feelings,” she said, in the formal tone of a schoolmarm. He fought hard to keep from snarling as those words fell from her mouth, furrowing his brow instead.

“I know you think it is fair, to want to delve into Dooku’s thoughts. And perhaps, if it is simply for knowledge, we can work together, to try to unlock his state of mind…” She reached out and squeezed his hand. “But it must be done for knowledge that aids the Republic, and not because you wish to save your friend. Once the dark side comes….” She looked so dour and gloomy he wanted to laugh, but refrained from looking anything other than suitably chastened.

“Forever will it dominate. For Dooku, it is too late,” she said, her face all sternness. He made sure not to smile, though she was, of course, both right (for once you had tasted darkness, what was light?). He let the blood drain slightly from his face, though the sight he imaged was not Dooku pledged in darkness, but rather, his opposite: Dooku returned to the light would surely be his undoing, and he’d take every step possible to prevent it. No, the former Jedi was only going to be returned to the Jedi in a box, if that. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be necessary much longer.

Perhaps even shorter, if Jocasta Nu continued to look at him like this: a curiosity in her eyes.

“Ah, my dear, I assure you, my thoughts are always for the Republic. Dooku’s loss is a tragedy, but I aim for him to be the last.” He grinned shamelessly now, victory a sweet upon his lips. He crossed the divide between them, effortlessly going into the staff area to clasp her shoulder and she did not wince, did not yell for him to go back. She blushed like a maid and smiled at him: a rare, genuine smile. He had the sense that she gave it rarely, and it was all the better for him. “Perhaps we could discuss this project over tea? I do know a good place in this sector with _fu’chmar_ tea.”

“We shall work up to that,” she said, eyes twinkling. “First, I have several tomes you’ll need for background information. Wait here a moment, Chancellor Palpatine.”

Sidious watched her lithe form as she moved to the stacks of datapads, and wondered if perhaps it would be tipping his hand too much to have two Jedi informants, not just Anakin. It was always good to have an insurance policy, and he’d have plenty of opportunities to figure out just what, exactly, Jocasta Nu would fall for.

He sighed lightly as six different dull-looking treatises piled around him, then six more, then three books so old and infrequently used he could see the dust upon the vellum. Jocasta looked at him with an upbeat expression, the hunger of a woman for knowledge. He knew the feeling.

He accepted the books, already dreading the reading. But, he supposed, some things were worth sacrifices.

Besides, it was only a matter of time until Nu — and all her books — passed into his possession.

There was something to be said about capturing a prize one had worked for — why shouldn’t he enjoy the chase?

“I shall return to you in a week for the tea?” He asked, bowing under the heavy datapad load.

“It is a date,” she said, eyebrows raised. “If you can finish that in a week.”

“Oh my dear, you don’t know what I’m capable of,” he purred. “But, perhaps — we will discover that together.” It had been a long time since he had someone as brilliant as Plageuis to bounce ideas off of; Skywalker was useful but he certainly wasn’t a genius on the level of Plageuis, and Naberrie’s issue had proved notably, dully _moral_. Dooku came close but…hm, judging by the relaxed expression on the librarian’s face, he had perhaps judged wrongly as to which senior member of the staff to seduce.

“I look forward to seeing more of you, Chancellor Palpatine,” she said, and a rare smile graced her features.

“I have a feeling we shall be seeing myself much more often,” Sidious said, daring to go so far as to press a kiss on her stunned fingertips before sauntering out of the Jedi halls.

Oh yes, he would be seeing much more of the librarian.

It was only a matter of time until his holocron would be in his fingertips, and perhaps, the librarian, too.

 


End file.
